


Convene

by laureltreedaphne



Category: Lord of the Rings RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-05
Updated: 2014-11-05
Packaged: 2018-02-24 06:23:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2571365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laureltreedaphne/pseuds/laureltreedaphne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He doesn't tell anyone, not even Billy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Convene

**Author's Note:**

> Migrating my work over from LiveJournal - this is a fic from 2003

Dominic wakes up sometimes with grass stains on his knees, looks down and finds smudges of brown on his ankles and layers of dirt underneath his fingernails, reaches up and brushes drying leaves from his hair. He doesn't tell anyone, not even Billy (especially not Billy). Instead, he's grown accustomed to taking his showers the minute he wakes up, ignoring the way that his unnaturally cold skin tingles under the burning temperature of the water. And when he stumbles downstairs, Billy hands him a cup of coffee and doesn't comment on the way his skin glows pink. 

*

Some mornings, he wakes up with skinned knees that make his sheets seem too rough and scrapes on his hands, angry scrapes where a couple of layers of skin have ripped off and the skin around is left angry, red and inflamed, like it's missing something. He doesn't bother to put bandages on them, he can't with filming, and he knows that even if they do heal they'll be back soon anyway. He likes to press down on them, likes to make himself wince, make his own hand twitch away. Billy frowns at him through Treebeard's synthetic leaves, forehead crinkling with worry (confusion) and Dominic presses harder. 

*

The makeup artist raises an eyebrow when she realizes that she doesn't have to do anything with Dominic's hands anymore, doesn't need to apply any makeup to make Merry look like he's been crawling around the woods for days. When Billy notices and grabs at his wrist, he lets out his breath in a sharp gasp. Quietly, he takes in the ragged fingernails, the dirt packed into cuticles that Dominic can't seem to get clean. "Christ, Dom," he finally says. "You been mimicking Lij or something?" Dominic wrenches his hand away. 

*

Dominic rarely dreams, but when he does he dreams of lush, green forests, soft moss underneath his knees, the smell of decay, and the way Billy's pale skin looks glistening with rain. He wakes up pressing his hips into his sheets, sticky inside his boxers, with a word, he's not sure which, dying on his lips. His hands brush what might be a spider web as he rolls over and spits the taste of soil out of his mouth. 

*

Billy's lips are soft, he tastes like clover and smells like bark, and Dominic's content to just rest like this, to not even move, just let their lips stay pressing against each other as dew pools on the backs of their hands. Billy's not though, Billy's pulling away and saying Dom (no), Dom (no, what's going on with you, Dom), and Dominic tastes dying flowers and smells burning wood. The next morning, his hands are raw, covered in a mixture of blood and dirt. His sheets are filled with pebbles that scrape against his skin, his hair is encrusted with mud. He doesn't bother to take a shower, but it doesn't matter, when Dom goes downstairs Billy's not there. In his place is a steaming cup of coffee with a note (no shooting today, it's raining too hard) , a tube of Neosporin, and bandages. The vase that held wilting flowers yesterday now holds a green sprig of some unidentifiable plant. Dom has the urge to rip its leaves, but somehow knows that that would make his aching hands hurt even more. Instead, he stumbles out of the kitchen and into the living room, sweeping the bandages into the trash can as he goes.

*

He goes upstairs to find Billy shaking out his sheets angrily, littering the floor with countless pebbles and bits of leaves and roots. Dominic wants to say something (why are you here, how did you get in without me hearing, leave my forest alone), but instead he clears his throat. Billy turns and stares, says, "What the fuck. Is going on." and goes back to cleaning the sheets. He's going to say more, Dominic can tell, so he cuts him off with his mouth and waits for Billy to move away. But Billy's mouth opens underneath his instead, and Dominic thinks that while Billy may have tasted like Autumn before, now he may taste like Spring. 

*

Dominic wakes up to Billy breathing hot against his neck and the coppery-tang scent of blood in the air. He brings a hand to his face, but there's nothing, no dirt, no scrapes, nothing. He turns to look at Billy and catches a flash of red underneath his chest, rolls Billy onto his back carefully so as not to wake him. Billy's hand is clenched around a rose, blood dripping onto his chest from the wounds where the thorns are piercing the sensitive skin of his palm. Dominic should take it away, the cuts will make it hard for Billy to do anything with that hand tomorrow, but instead he leaves it, wraps his hand around Billy's, and goes back to sleep.


End file.
